Monday, January 26, 2015

Bring It On!

Assuming the venerable Amherst Select Board is hardy enough to meet this evening they will hear a half-year budget update that shows good news and bad news from the DPW budget line:

Original budget, Amount spent, Encumbered, % of budget spent

Good news is of course the ambitious LED lighting retrofit of all the street lights in town is paying off handsomely in electricity savings (only consuming 15% of the budget at the half-way point).

And, almost as important, the new LED lighting in the Amherst Town Room (where the SB meets) makes photos look a lot better as well.

The snow and ice budget is not really 29.4% in thered, as Guilford Mooring points out the amount shown as "encumbered" reflects a full season's worth of supplies. But he does verify that tomorrow's Snowmageddon will most likely bust the budget:

Click to enlarge/read

Even that, however, should be mitigated by Federal Emergency Mgt Agency reimbursement if things turn out as bad as universally predicted.

The DPW are the unsung heroes at times like tonight, tomorrow and maybe even into Wednesday.

Public safety personnel simply could not do their potentially lifesaving jobs if not for those big yellow trucks keeping the streets passable. Another good reason to stay off the roads once the snow starts to fly:

So, 7:15 AM, when you go to work does your boss tell you that your family better be prepared to deal with any emergency on their own for 36 hours cause they can't count on you? That's what some of them were told. Its a tough job. Would a simple thank you hurt you that bad?